How the state of Missouri became a battlefield 

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Gen. Sterling Price’s Confederate Army of Missouri was in trouble. 

Moving thousands of soldiers hundreds of miles attracts unwanted attention. 

Union Chief of Staff Gen. Henry Halleck began shifting his armies to counter Price’s invasion of Missouri, like he was playing chess. 

Price changed strategies and course, turning West at Union, Missouri, moving on the State Capital and forgoing St. Louis. The Southern army’s problem taking Pilot Knob combined with Halleck’s deployment of new forces caused Price to alter plans. 

The Confederates reached well fortified Jefferson City in early October 1864. Rather than repeat the mistake at Pilot Knob weeks earlier, Price went around the Capital. 

Reconnaissance had indicated the city of Glasgow, just up the Missouri River, as having a trove of weapons and ammunition in their arsenal. Price sent two cavalry regiments to take the town and relieve them of anything useful. 

During the Civil War, with weapon limitations and supply issues, it’s consequential for an army to select where an inevitable battle will take place. Terrain is everything. 

Most of Price’s fighting units in this raid were cavalry with a couple famous Missourians at the helm. 

Brigadier Gen. Joe Shelby, renowned for his Missouri cavalry raid in 1863 where his “Iron Brigade," of Missouri volunteers covered 1,500 miles, -- the longest raid in the Civil War -- surprising Union fortifications, destroying Yankee supplies and creating general havoc behind enemy lines. 

The general from Waverly, Missouri, was revered by his men, with many paying tribute on their gravestone: “One of Shelby’s men.” 

Major Gen. John S. Marmaduke, from Marshall, Missouri, also commanded a cavalry Division on Price’s Raid. Marmaduke attended both Yale and Harvard and later went on to become Missouri’s 25th governor after the war.

The future governor was a fierce commander, demanding excellence. During the Battle of Reed’s Bridge on Aug. 26, 1863, Marmaduke accused fellow Gen. Lucius Walker basically of cowardice by not being with his men during the fight. Insulting notes were exchanged, offending Walker, manly satisfaction demanded which was emphatically accepted. 

At dawn on Sunday, Sept. 6, 1863, the duel was on. Walker and Marmaduke squared off with Colt pistols on the north bank of the Arkansas River near Little Rock. At a distance of 15 paces both men fired and missed. Marmaduke re-cocked, fired and mortally wounded Walker. 

Marmaduke walked over to Walker and offered assistance to the dying general. Walker's second that morning, happened to be Robert Crockett, grandson of Davy. 

Later that day the dead general’s wife gave birth to Lucius Walker Jr. 

Sterling Price ordered Marmaduke arrested for murder. 

The general never faced a trial or was relieved from duty, there was a war going on don’t you know. 

At Glasgow, the Union contingent made up of units from St. Joseph were outnumbered with no support. Overrun after a two-day siege, the St. Joseph newspaper Herald Tribune, a Unionist paper, demanded answers from the area commanders after many wounded soldiers made it back to town on the train detailing what happened.

“Where was Gen. Blunt, where was our artillery, where were the re-enforcements,” demanded the editor! 

The Glasgow victory gave the confederates needed weapons, ammunition and a morale boost. 

Price continued west along the Missouri River, but now in hot pursuit from St. Louis was General Alfred Pleasanton’s Cavalry Division of 7,000 men. 

Next stop on Price’s tour of river towns was a return visit to Lexington. This would be something of a victory lap for the General, having defeated the Yankees earlier in 1861 while commanding Missouri's State Guard.

Price, no doubt, thought he would find great support and additional recruits, wrong! 

People were tired of war, passions can run deep but an individual’s survival is innate. Everyone had been touched by the hostilities in one way or another. 

Shelby’s, “Iron Brigade," led by St. Joseph’s old mayor General M. Jeff Thompson, advanced on the now present Union General James Blunt’s lesser force. 

Blunt, in defending Lexington, had hoped for reinforcement help from Gen. Samuel Curtis' newly-formed Army of the Border, which was made up primarily of Kansas militia. Kansans and Missourians had a unique disdain for one another due to years of the "Border War.”

Curtis sent Blunt word he was not coming, turned out the “Army of the Border,” refused to go deep into Missouri. 

So much for military discipline. 

Blunt withdrew, moving west to join the stagnant Army destroying bridges, trying to slow Price, Shelby, Marmaduke and Thompson down. 

At the Little Blue River, Blunt took up positions on the opposite shore, waiting for the inevitable attack, it came. The Union line held off the larger Confederate vanguard for hours but still no Curtis. Blunt received orders from Curtis to pullback into Independence, Missouri. 

On Oct. 20, 1864, Price crossed the Little Blue just eight miles east of Independence with his main force. Fierce fighting raged in the trailhead town that afternoon and evening, with Price finally forcing Blunt out. 

That night many of Price's troops camped in a dug out railroad bed but were greeted the next morning with their worst nightmare. 

Pleasanton, now with 10,000 cavalry men from St Louis, had reached the Little Blue. 

Unbeknownst to Price, the two converging forces outnumbered the Confederates by more than 3 to 1. 

The vice was closing, in the next few days western Missouri would experience fighting on a scale never seen in this theater. The bloodiest battle in the West was about to commence with the future of the State of Missouri in the balance. 

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